FPL GAMEMONTH MARCH: Part 2

Okay, so my plans - the month of April is very tricky for me.

Here are the gameweeks it has:

GW29: Double Gameweek

GW30:

GW31:

GW32: Blank Gameweek

GW33:

GW34: Double Gameweek

So navigating all this with just one week to make transfers is a challenge.

My plan is to make my changes in GW29, this current week ..and to bench boost. (I'll then have the wildcard as a luxury option in the final month of May.)

I'm going to bring in a goalkeeper (probably De Gea) and make 1, 2 or 3 other transfers (I still haven't quite decided yet). So a possible minus 4 or minus 8.

Problems

There are a few quite annoying problems. Firstly, that blank GW32, where Brighton, Chelsea, Man City and Man Utd all miss games. Brighton, City and Utd each then have a double in GW34. Obviously I'd like to have players from those teams going into that week, but if I want a full eleven in GW32 then I can only have a bench-worth of those players (and this is hoping I'll have no injuries in my squad by that point).

So, along with De Gea (or possibly Ederson) I'll be keeping Mitoma and Haaland, and then either keeping De Bruyne or switching him for Rashford. So those will be my four from those three teams. No more than that sadly.

(My current favoured transfer plan is to take a minus 4 to take out De Bruyne, Almiron, and Crystal Palace's Anderson, to bring in Rashford, Bowen and Alexander-Arnold. This would give me a potentially nice team for GW34. Also Bowen, aside from two doubles, will have Bournemouth in GW32, so that would give me a little more firepower in that tricky blank.)

The other annoying issue is captaincy. Only having one week to make changes means I'll have to set and forget the captain. Of course, I want, nay need, to have Haaland captain in GW34, so that means I'll have to go into my bench boost GW29 with Haaland as captain - where he just has a single game against Liverpool. He also still has a yellow flag on fpl which is a concern. Still, Haaland is special, so it potentially could work out better than it looks on paper.

Anyhow, I'll make my changes later in the week when I have more injury and team news. It's tricky, buy it's also quite fun, so I'm enjoying it.

Current Points: 1,605

Current Rank: 2,310,164

FPL GAMEMONTH MARCH: Part 1

This'll be a two-parter. The first simply to chart my gameweeks since the last post. Things have picked up a bit since then - I've moved from a rank of over 4 million to one of 2.3 million. My GW25 in particular was good, where I triple-captained Saka and got 140 points. So things aren't quite as bad as they were. It's still not exactly a laudable rank though, and the coming weeks could easily set me back again.

Anyway, the weeks thus:

GW25: 140 (avg. 74)

GW26: 61 (avg. 43)

GW27: 67 (-4), (avg. 63)

GW28: 58 (avg. 33)

Next I'll post about my plans for April and May (in March I made my changes in GW27 - I took a minus 4 and brought in Mee, Mbeumo and Mitoma).

Gamemonth February

Wow, it's quite the struggle this gamemonth management lark. It doesn't help that I'm having to post late after midnight either. My sleepy eyes are heavy, but if I don't do it now it'll be after the deadline. So let's get on top of this.

Since I last posted I've had two very bad weeks and one good week. Both bad weeks I was once again punished for not owning Rashford - fortunately I won't have to worry about that in GW25.

GW22:

(26 points - average was 48!)

GW23:

(84 points - average was 66)

GW24:

(36 points - average was 44)

Going Forward

I've bitten off more than I can chew playing monthly. It's just too difficult trying to keep up with people that have the luxury of making changes every week. Especially now that double gameweeks are coming thick and fast. So I'm not hopeful.

I have three chips left to use and four months in which to use them (including this month of February). I've been trying to come up with a plan of action. I was calling it my gamemonth masterplan, but it's more like a master-plaster, sticking over the damage as best I can.

The current plan is to use the triple captain this week (GW25 - the last week in February). Then use one of the weeks in March to make a few free transfers to navigate the blank GW28. Meaning I'll then have to wildcard sometime in April and bench boost in May.

How exactly I'll use those chips in April and May I have no idea.

THIS WEEK

As for this specific week this is how I'm going. I'll be triple captaining Saka. Tarkowski seems like a sensible player to bring in (Shaw has went), and I've brought in Van Dijk - largely because he's the only decent Liverpool player I can afford. I wasn't happy taking Trippier out, what with Newcastle having a decent fixture in blank GW28. However, I'm struggling, so I'll just have to gamble that Liverpool don't blank that week either.

I need miracles.

Current Rank: 4,124,589

Gamemonths December and January

Obviously I've lost interest quite heavily this season. My last blog post was back in November, before the World Cup. Since then I've still been playing, and I've kept to the monthly rules, however it has largely been an afterthought for me.

Anyhow, here are my points since then:

(The game week average is in brackets.)

GW16:                50                (43)

GW17:                79                (72)
GW18:                59                (48)

GW19:                52                (49)

GW20:                56                (59)

GW21:                66                (65)

I've climbed in rank slightly. I'm now sitting at 3,552,945 (!)

I don't think I've done too badly overall. Foden has been a huge fail. Just four points over the six fixtures since I brought him in. Had I had Rashford instead the situation would be quite different. So it's fine margins.

Amazingly I made zero transfers in January. I set my team up before the restart and when January came around I was fairly happy with the squad so didn't want to remove anyone. However, I chose to make changes in GW19 just to bring Mitrovic off the bench for that Fulham double. With Mitrovic missing the second game that turned out to be unwise.

Still, it's not too bad.

I have a few flags now, so I'm not entirely sure what my next move will be, though it's likely I'll leave things as is for GW22 and make changes deeper into February.

Planning will be key. There are four months remaining and I have three chips left to play: wildcard; bench boost and triple captain. So some thinking is required.

Next Year.

I'm already wondering about next season. I quite like the idea of playing monthly again. It's been interesting and it's suited the half-hearted attitude I currently have towards fpl. Likewise this season has been a learning curve, so it would be fun to have another go with more foreknowledge.

The one big snag though is that it doesn't lend itself well to playing fpl with the people you know in real life. Having to explain that you're 'playing monthly' when the topic pops up is a bit of a faff on. So that could be the deciding factor.

FPL: Gamemonth October/November

A quick update regarding Gamemonth October.

In October I chose to free hit in GW12. It was quite a sensible decision, however it didn't really pay off. I think I'd have had more points that week had I just left things. It was then diminishing returns for the rest of the month.

I then made a few changes as we moved into Gamemonth November. Bringing Bowen and Firmino in for the injured Son and the suspended Toney in GW15.

(Gameweeks 12 through 15)

(Red and green arrows)

In hindsight it would've probably been smarter to bring in Salah. In fact, I think had I been playing weekly that's what I would've done. This season I'm enjoying things too much though. I'm a huge fan of Bowen, and Firmino is my favourite Liverpool player. So I'm really playing for enjoyment more than anything at the moment.

I've definitely took things a lot less seriously this season playing monthly. It's going to give me a big decision at the end of the season. Do I keep playing this way - hands off, enjoying things, not caring a great deal about rank? Or do I go back to the standard way of playing and aim for the stars - with all the time, stress and attention to detail that involves?

With the World Cup on the horizon all thoughts about fpl can go on hold though. There's one more weekend of Premier League fixtures before it starts and my team is set in stone. Hopefully I can have a decent week to boost my rank a little before the second half of the season.

Overall Points: 775

Overall Rank: 3,631,995

FPL Gamemonth October: Free Hit

As you can see from the title I'm going with the free hit for Gamemonth October. However, before that we'll look at the late summer fruits of Gamemonth September.

Since I hit the wildcard in GW7 it's been nonstop green arrows. I'm now up to 3.5m from around 6.5m. So it's been pretty good.

(GW7 was postponed of course)

(Gamemonth September team points

- click to enlarge)

Almiron in particular has worked wonders coming off the bench. Making my bench picks a lot more worthwhile than they were with my Gamemonth August side.

GW12: The Free Hit

The free hit has chosen itself really. The few injuries aside my team has been ticking along pretty nicely, and I'm fairly hopeful that it'll cope well enough for the rest of October. With Manchester City and Arsenal blanking in GW12 though I would've been struggling to get a team out this particular week. So it makes good sense for me to free hit now to navigate it.

The free hit was always going to be a tricky chip to use with me playing monthly. Only being allowed to make changes once a month means you want to make long term changes when you do get the opportunity. So a one-week tinker around isn't ideal when you have systemic issues with your team.

With my team looking fairly solid though this feels like the perfect opportunity to maximise the chip. It allows me to keep my City and Arsenal players long term, whilst also allowing me to get an optimal side out for the one week I would've had problems.

Hopefully it works out well and I get a little rank boost from it.

(Gamemonth October Wildcard)

As I sit typing we're just waiting for the Tuesday night fixtures to start [the above image shows points as I had to wait for the game to update to grab a screenshot 😠]. They're not glamourous ties - Brighton vs Nottingham Forest and Palace vs Wolves. I've bet big on Wolves and Forest not scoring though, so the success of my free hit will in large part be decided tonight. So we have some minor excitement.

I then need my big hitters to come in tomorrow to finish the job.

November should be a fairly comfortable month to deal with, as there are only two gameweeks. So I just need my guys to get me through the rest of October once this week is done.

Overall Points: 568

Overall Rank: 3,451,708

FPL Gamemonth September: We Finally Got There

All Queenly detours aside this is how I eventually went on the wildcard.

As I type Fulham are currently 3-1 up, but Mitrovic has nothing. It's typical of course given I missed all his previous returns, but I was expecting it. This is just what the fpl gods do to us.

With GW12 now being a blank I'll probably have to make that the week I choose for Gamemonth October too. So much for the degree of flexibility. I'll have to take Martinelli out just to get a full eleven out, and that's assuming no other issues arise.

It may have been foolish given the blank to go with three City plus Martinelli, but City are so good I want three both before and after the blank.

As you can see Haaland is captain. This feels like the super sensible choice, but things are rarely that simple. I was very tempted to stick with Son. I like the Spurs fixtures, but I feared it was sentiment getting the better of me. (How can you go against Haaland at this point?)

Originally I had Luis Diaz instead of Kulusevski before the postponements. I'm planning on heading back in that direction in October (transfers allowing). I did have James in place of Trippier too. So the effective cancellation of GW7 has changed my team slightly, but only in a few positions.

Almiron is my little bench punt (an extravagance afforded by these forced downgrades). Obviously I'll need him for certain this week, so hopefully he plays and looks involved (I've actually made zero effort to check if he's even nailed on to start, so I hope I don't have cause to regret my laziness. I think he should be okay though.)

Oh, and before I go - the keepers. I know, I know, Ward has been dreadful, but the price is irresistible and I really needed that cash to shore up my team. Surely Leicester can't continue to be that bad in defence. So it's a beggars can't be choosers situation for me. I'm in no position to be going for luxury keeper options.

The Forest v Fulham game has now finished. Fulham won 3-2. Impressive start to the wildcard. Toney will probably blank too now. Pereira did pick up a yellow though, so with luck I've missed his one-pointer.